


Darkest Before The Dawn

by JanecShannon



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Star Trek Into Darkness - Fandom, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Fusion, Gen, Spoilers, Star Trek: Into Darkness, Tagging as I go, spoilers for the movie
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-30
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2017-12-13 11:56:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/824035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JanecShannon/pseuds/JanecShannon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This time, its John's turn to be woken from cryostasis and as usual... It's up to him to soothe tempers and clean up the messes Sherlock leaves behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to somethingclever for betaing :D (Is there a way to set the beta of a story on Ao3? I don't see one but if there someone please let me know)
> 
> Ok, so I've had to kinda tweak the time timelines a bit for this to make them work together. The interest says that Into Darkness takes place in 2259. So, assuming Sherlock comes back from The Hiatus in 2015, that would only be about 240 years (not 300). 
> 
> I'm fudging the math a bit to make things work.

The quiet hiss of Cryotube 42 opening was loud in the silent chamber, though there was no one around to hear it. It took several minutes for the short blonde man inside to wake properly. The room was pitch black, but that could have been done purposely by whoever had triggered his cryotube to open. He tried to move, but strangely found himself stuck halfway in the tube still. A malfunction? Frowning, he wiggled around and managed to get one arm free. He felt around and found that the foot of another tube had blocked his from sliding him out fully. Realization dawned, and he was on edge instantly.

This was not their ship. 

First things first, he needed to get out of his cryotube. It restricted his movement and lying on his back, half immobile, was not a good place to be in should this be hostile territory. He had no way of knowing how long they'd been out, or how they had gotten off their ship and into this dark place. Sherlock's tube should have triggered him to wakefulness the instant their ship detected anything amiss. Chances were high that there was danger about. Sherlock would not have allowed him to wake alone if it could be helped and there were only a few scenarios where his tube was hardcoded to waken him automatically. 

He listened carefully before making a move. There were no sounds of life beyond his own. There was no breathing, no rustling fabric or shuffling feet, not even the quiet pumping of blood in veins that he could now hear, thanks to the modifications the Baskerville Project had made to him and the others. 

Deeming it safe enough, he carefully shimmied out of his tube. His combat boots touched the floor silently, but there must have been some kind of pressure or motion sensors because the pitch black of the room was flooded with low level lighting. 

He cursed silently to himself. If this was hostile territory, he'd likely just alerted them to his presence. He needed to find Sherlock... _Now._

At least the lighting would help with that, even he was unable to see in pitch darkness. 

Glancing around, it looked like the appropriate number of cryotubes surrounded him, but he wasn't Sherlock and couldn't eyeball the exact number. Physically, Baskerville had greatly improved them, but messing with brain chemistry had been too great of a risk. Especially since there hadn’t been time for failure or retrials (though he suspected Mycroft had a hand in the decision not to as well). Fortunately, a look to his left showed Tube 41 (Filly, short for Fillamina, a stern woman who respected skill above anything else) and at his right Tube 43 (Alec, a sweet boy, far too young for this, but quick on his feet). 

Whoever had placed them here had been kind enough to put them in numerical order, which was kind of them, but also very telling. Humans, most likely, or at least a race that understood human symbols. 

It should make Sherlock easy to find though. _I’m the leader. I’ll be in tube one. It will set a correlation in anyone’s mind that those in the tubes are ordered by importance,_ Sherlock had explained to him. And the rest of the tubes had been in order of rank and importance. Bernard (Second Officer, a bit of a bastard but one hell of a pilot) had been placed in tube two and John, First Officer, had been told to pick an arbitrary number somewhere in the middle. _Not at the end, any intruders will think you expendable, nor too near the beginning. If something happens we need them to underestimate your importance._

So John had laughed and taken Tube 42. He’d had to explain it to Sherlock, of course. _Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy? The answer to the greatest question in the universe is 42._

He’d expected Sherlock to scoff or, possibly, laugh but instead he’d stared at John and answered in all seriousness, _Forty-two seems highly appropriate._

John had just found Sherlock’s Tube when bright light flooded the room followed by the near-silent hiss of a door sliding open. Before Baskerville, the sudden change would have blinded him temporarily, but now he was able to instantly crouch down, hidden by all the other tubes in the room and begin the manual waking sequence for Sherlock. 

He wouldn’t have much time. Apparently his tube had been relatively close to the door and he could tell they found it quick enough. They also seemed to guess exactly where he went (or maybe they had sensors of some kind to tell them) because they dispersed themselves in a pattern that would quickly surround and corner him. 

Well... Try to, anyway. He’d probably let them. He needed to know more about the situation and technology available before he did anything rash. He didn’t want to hurt anyone unnecessarily. 

“Sir, we need you to stand slowly, and step away from the cryotube,” a voice commanded him. He glanced up at the reflective surface of the window plate of Sherlock’s tube. Fourteen. No, he could hear some beyond the view of the window. Eighteen at least. Possibly twenty. 

Either they knew who he and his crew were and the stereotypes they had fought so hard and slept so long to get away from still existed or these people didn’t know the meaning of the word _Overkill._

Or Sherlock had been awake at some point and had made a less than stellar impression. 

... That was... Actually that seemed pretty likely. 

John sighed in exasperation and typed the final number of the code to sync the waking sequence to the remote device on his wrist. He rose to his feet and, keeping his arms loose at his side, put on his most affable smile as he turned around. “Are the, um,” he paused to study the weapons the people held in their hands, they were unfamiliar to him and he was unsure what to call them, “Guns? really necessary?” he asked politely.

Apparently the guns were necessary because the people holding them neither lowered them nor gave him any kind of answer. 

"Right, okay," John nodded his head. "I'm Dr. Watson," he told them, keeping himself from using his rank with Sherlock's words echoing in his ears, _We need them to underestimate you._ "I'm just trying to wake my commanding officer up," he added, playing up the natural _I’m a doctor, you can trust me_ air that Sherlock always teased him about. 

They didn't relax but the air became less hostile. "We need you to step away from him, Dr. Watson." 

“Alright,” he agreed and held his hands in a placating gesture as he stepped away from the cryotube. "Where am I? What year is it?" 

They finally relaxed a smidgen as he stepped away... Sherlock having pissed them off was looking more and more likely. One of them, the one that had spoken before, lowered his weapon entirely. 

"I'm Lt. Bradley of Starfleet Command. You are currently on Earth.”

John frowned and his eyes drifted to the frozen man once more, if only for an instant. Why would Sherlock bring them back here only to allow them (and himself) to remain frozen? At least on the ship they had defenses and home ground advantage. 

"Your commanding officer made a bit of a mess when he was awake. From my understanding you've been in cryostasis for over 300 years. It would be wise to get you to a medical bay. Will you cooperate willingly, Dr. Watson?"

John nodded. He would do Sherlock and his crew no good if he was suffering any damage from the lengthy period of cryostasis. So far, Lt. Bradley and his men had left the others alone and had been un-threatening once he’d shown he himself was not a threat. 

For now, at least, he’d do as they asked. Once he’d determined his own state, he could determine that of the rest of his crew.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to SomethingClever for betaing again :D

John couldn't help the way his eyes darted about once they reached the medical bay. "Bit different than my day," he murmured quietly, chuckling at his own private joke. 

But it was different. His day had focused on war, defense, repairing damage as quickly as possible to get soldiers back out to the front lines. The Baskerville Project had won them the war and led them to a better existence. 

John was glad; this is what he had fought for. 

And when they led him to one of the medical beds and explained that it could essentially act as an MRI, CAT, X-ray machine (among others) he couldn’t keep his interest from bubbling up and distracting him for just one moment from the thought of Sherlock and the rest of the crew. 

He hesitated when they asked for a sample of blood. Scans were one thing but he had learned to be careful with his blood. There was nothing the stasis chamber could have caused that they’d need his blood to check for. 

"Scanners could detect that sort of damage even in my day," John answered. He pointedly tugged the long sleeves of his shirt down.

“We just want to compare it to the sample we already have on file,” the other doctor insisted good-naturedly.

“What other sample? We destroyed all the samples taken from us before we left Earth three centuries ago. You couldn’t have gotten a sample without waking one of us up.” Knots of worry began to twist in John’s stomach. He’d seen Sherlock, he reminded himself. Sherlock had been _fine_... but how many tubes had there been in that room? He hadn’t counted. If one of the other crew had woken, would they have just left the rest of them? 

Myfanwy might have. Derek definitely would have. 

Sherlock would have been awake when these people found their ship... It’s possible he could have given them the sample they spoke of. It was always difficult to predict exactly what the detective would do ( _and_ , he thought to himself, _you had thought these people’s reactions could have been caused by Sherlock’s less than stellar behavior_ ). 

“Who did you wake up and where are they now?” John demanded but he was kept from pressing harder when a _too_ familiar voice interrupted from the door. 

“Khan made quite a mess the last time he was here, Dr. Watson. We were merely attempting to mitigate some of the damage he left in his wake.”

“ _Mycroft?_ ” John uttered in disbelief (and completely ignoring, for now, that he had absolutely no idea who _Khan_ was). The elder Holmes was older than when John had last seen him, but either way three hundred years is not within the lifespan of a normal human being. He should have been dead, not old.

Mycroft gave John a thoughtful look, but John knew him too well to believe any twitch of the other man’s facial muscles was less than voluntary. “You must have known one of my ancestors. I’m told I’m quite the likeness.”

John’s eyes narrowed. “It’s uncanny,” he agreed dryly.

“I can take it from here, Dr. Kelvig,” Mycroft told the other man.

“Admiral Holmes, if his bloo-” the other doctor began but Mycroft interrupted him before he could finish his sentence. 

“I’ll take care of it, doctor. You’re dismissed.” John’s eyes flicked between the two suspiciously but he didn’t question it as the other doctor (lips pursed and an annoyed look on his face) turned to leave. Mycroft caught his attention just as he made it out the door to add, “Send Dr. McCoy along to the medical centre, would you? Tell him I’ll meet him there.”

“Of course, sir,” Dr. Kelvig answered, the look in his eyes was one of resentment. 

When the door hissed closed, John commented, “You’ll have trouble with him.”

Mycroft hummed. “We already have trouble with him. He was a supporter of Admiral Marcus though we can’t prove he was doing anything beyond following orders.” John rolled his eyes. Age had clearly done little to temper the habits of the elder Holmes brother. Clearly he still loved to show off by letting slip bits and pieces of information when you had no clue what he was referring to. 

“Mycroft, how are you still alive?”

The other man sighed tiredly and gestured to a pair of chairs. Once they were seated, he began to speak, “It was decided that while my talents would perhaps be wasted out in the field doing... _legwork_ ,” he said the word with a mild sneer, “It would indeed be wise for me to be... enhanced... should an attack on prominent government officials occur."

“Sherlock estimated the biological changes would only extend our lives by a hundred years. A hundred-fifty at best. You _can’t_ be alive still, Mycroft.”

"I am alive through a combination of the biological changes you mentioned and using cryostasis instead of sleeping on a regular basis."

"That wouldn't work. If you need sleep before you enter stasis, you still need it when you wake up. Not to mention the cellular damage that would be done by the repeated freezing and unfreezing."

"For an average human, that would be the case, yes,” the elder Holmes drawled. “But you are perfectly aware of how quickly we heal and how little sleep we now require. It’s pointless for me to be awake every night when most are asleep."

"So basically, you're alive through the use of good time management," John snorted

"Quite."

John was silent for a moment, glaring at the other man but somehow not the least surprised. Finally, he broke the silence with, “Sherlock was awake first.”

“Whatever makes you say that, Doctor?”

“For one, he would have been awake before anyone could have gotten _near_ our ship, let alone close enough to disconnect us and bring us here.”

“Perhaps his Tube malfunctioned?” Mycroft offered.

“Mine too? That’s a pretty big coincidence,” the good doctor answered in a tone that made it very clear precisely how much of a coincidence it _wasn’t_. The admiral sighed; his silence was as good as a confession. “What happened?” John pressed. 

"You have seen what he is capable of when there are only three threatened," Mycroft answered heavily. "Imagine the result of seventy-two."

John grimaced, those three years were not a time he liked to think about, but it was the number that caught his attention more than anything. "There were seventy-four of us that got off the planet, Mycroft," he narrowed his eyes dangerously. “Minus Sherlock that would leave seventy-three of us to be threatened. Who’s missing?”

Mycroft made a show of pulling out some kind of digital pad and studying it. “According to the Admiral who found your ship, Tube 2 was found to have been severely damaged in whatever attack took out your ship’s navigation sensors and shield matrix. Khan-- that is Sherlock, please do get used to calling him that for the time being-- was found barely conscious on what appeared to be the bridge of the ship. They assumed Tube 1 belonged to him as there were clear signs of Tubes seventy-five through one hundred never having been used.”

John closed his for just a moment as relief and guilt battled in his chest. He learned a long time ago that records aren’t to be trusted implicitly... Sherlock had been right: whoever invaded their ship made sure to take out the second in command. Bernard had been under his command, had been one of his men, and _it should have been him._

But John didn’t let these thoughts linger. 

Bernard was dead but John still had seventy-two people to protect and that was a far more pressing matter. 

He squared his shoulders and brought himself up to his full height. If Mycroft noticed John’s rallying (and he did, of course he did, he was a Holmes) he said nothing of it and merely motioned towards the door. 

“We need to meet Dr. McCoy in the medical centre,” Mycroft rose to his feet and motioned towards the door. “There are certain things that must be discussed relating to Khan’s actions before the idea of waking your crew can even be considered.”


	3. Chapter 3

_He squared his shoulders and brought himself up to his full height. If Mycroft noticed John’s rallying (and he did, of course he did, he was a Holmes) he said nothing of it and merely motioned towards the door._

_“We need to meet Dr. McCoy in the medical centre,” Mycroft rose to his feet and motioned towards the door. “There are certain things that must be discussed relating to Kahn’s actions before the idea of waking your crew can even be considered.”_

* * *

London had changed. The buildings were less brick-and-mortar and more sleek steel-and-glass (though to be fair they’d been on there way there when John had walked the streets freely). 

“Not glass,” Mycroft interrupted John’s thoughts, “It’s a polycarbonate compound similar, though not exactly the same, to what they used to make corrective lenses out of three centuries ago. Stronger, more durable, and far cheaper to make these days.”

It had never been eerie when Sherlock read John’s thoughts like that but Mycroft was another matter. John didn’t like to be so transparent to him (or anyone) the way he was to Sherlock. 

“So plastic,” John answered, knowing the difference between the materials but also knowing the reaction he’d get from Mycroft would be too good to miss. 

“It’s not _plastic_ ,” the elder Holmes sniffed haughtily, looking a bit like he'd taken a bit out of a lemon. “It’s a highly dense polycarbonate-”

“Which is plastic,” John muttered and glanced out the _polycarbonate_ window of the elevator they were on. 

He heard Mycroft click his tongue but was saved from further lecturing by the door sliding open. “Ah, here we are. This way, doctor.”

That was fine. 

Goading Mycroft wasn’t nearly as much fun without Sherlock around to play along anyway.

* * *

The entire floor Mycroft led him to was white. Bright, sterile white. Unlike hospitals from John’s own time which always seemed to start that way but eventually faded to a sort of yellowish-ivory that reminded John of old bones. 

London may have changed, technologies and studies advanced, but John wasn’t so far out of touch that he couldn’t recognise an ICU when he saw one. Every bed had monitors, the values of which were all duplicated on screens at what appeared to be a nurses’ station. Each patient was divided from the others, kept separate by thick clear walls. The air around them had the static quality of filtered air. Not quite clean room standards but close enough for Intensive Care. 

Mycroft indicated one of the beds and handed John a medical tablet. “If you would, Dr. Watson,” he said and waved his hand in an _after you_ gesture. 

John glanced over the file as he walked. “Male. Early twenties. I’m not familiar with this particular type of radiation but even so I can tell he was exposed to a lethal dose. Treated with a transfusion of blood from...” he stopped walking as his voice trailed off. “Khan Noonien Singh,” he finished in a murmur. The name was vaguely familiar but it took him a moment to make the connection.

He found himself unable to keep his fury in check. 

“So this is why you kept us around?!” he demanded, waving his free hand at the screen. “Just to harvest our blood as a cure-all?”

“Captain Kirk received radiation poisoning while saving the lives of his crew and those of an entire city,” Mycroft spoke quickly, appealing to the doctor rather than the soldier in the man before him. 

“But it wasn’t enough, was it, Mycroft? It says here the sedatives in his blood inhibited the healing.”

“Hundreds, if not thousands, are alive because of this man’s actions. People Khan would have killed. It was decided it was too much of a risk to wait for him to regenerate the blood and harvest a second batch. If he were to wake-”

“So, what? You just decided to wake another one of us? Why not grab the blood while we’re still waking up from cryostasis? We wouldn’t be able to say no then!”

“It was decided it was too much of a risk to wake another-”

“And yet here I am,” John said, his face morphing into a dangerous smile. 

"I cannot soothe tempers this time, Dr. Watson. He simply went too far.” John hated how he sounded so reasonable. Mycroft had a way of making even the most ridiculous things sound reasonable. “You were not woken intentionally but, as you say, here you are. Let us both take advantage of the situation," Mycroft urged. 

At that, the good doctor stared at the unconscious man on the medical bed, he could feel his will begin to fold but it wasn’t Mycroft’s words or even his tone that were changing his mind. John Watson had become a doctor because he wanted to help people and his moral fibre wouldn't allow him to sit by and do nothing when he had the ability to help. 

“I help him and then what?” John sighs, “Every time you have someone you deem worthy of saving, one of my soldiers will be asked to help. If we refuse, we’re painted as monsters with no conscious. And of course there’s the matter of who would be the one to choose who to save?” He started calm but the more he spoke the more heat his argument gained. “ _This_ is why we decided to leave, Mycroft! This is why you _helped_ us leave. Because people stopped seeing us as humans and thought of us as nothing but tools.” John crossed his arms with a glare. “I have a duty to the men and women who serve under me. I won’t let them go through that again. I won’t let _Sherlock_ go through that again.”

“Dr. Watson-” 

“No.”

Mycroft stares for a long moment before he speaks again, looking a bit like he has to drag the tone of pleading from some dusty box, “ _John_.”

“The answer is no, Mycroft.” 

Mycroft looked like he might speak again but a throat clears from behind them. 

“You know it's typically considered polite to at least _inform_ the primary physician before bringing in someone else.” 

John glanced down at the chart in his hands having forgotten he was holding it during the argument. 

“Ah, Dr. McCoy,” Mycroft canted, “So good of you to join us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ha. So. Not a doctor. Not even close. I'm just kinda making up medical stuff and hoping it sounds accurate lol


End file.
